|
Bloodnose posted:This is the part that was extremely prevalent in Mao's China that's completely gone from post-Mao China. It was a really stark change too. I think Zohar used the term "flipped a switch" to mock me or something but that's pretty much what happened immediately after the purge of the Gang of Four. The monks started reappearing in public, people started attending mass, burning joss sticks and otherwise practicing traditional religion. And it was tolerated or even encouraged by the government because they knew they needed something to replace the now absent political religion. I was referring to the idea that the political practices of the CCP changed fundamentally after the death of Mao. There's a large body of literature out there arguing that the CCP's methods of political mobilisation have not actually changed that much since the Maoist era, and that's seemingly going to become even more true under Xi. The handful of years at the climax of the Cultural Revolution which is what most people seem to associate with 'Maoism' were the exception and not the norm for China under Mao -- the question is what sort of political regime existed in China in, say, the 50s, not the late 60s, and whether that sort of 'totalitarianism' is comparable to current political practices. I think the narrative you're presenting here specifically is way off with regards to 'political religion' though. The CCP takes a very dim view indeed of any form of religious practice that looks like it might intrude into the political sphere, I certainly don't buy that they're replacing their own ideology with some external political religion. That's the entire basis of their persecution of groups like most famously the Falun Gong, or the highly localised quasi-religious peasant movements that arose fairly often in the 90s and 2000s (I don't know if they're still a thing). The revival of Confucianism is an exception here but not an exception to my actual point, since it's centrally managed and used deliberately. dilbertschalter posted:Saying that this or that word was "misappropriated" is a fruitless exercise. The meaning of terms isn't set in stone by the people who use them first, but rather by the trajectory of their general use. "Totalitarianism" became popular as a way of pairing Nazi Germany with Soviet Russia, so while it's perfectly fine to point out the original meaning that doesn't mean that people are somehow incorrect for not using it. It's not so much 'misappropriation' as that it doesn't apply in the way it's supposed to apply. Stalinist Russia and Nazi Germany, the two regimes that the usual idea of 'totalitarianism' is supposed to describe, are so different to the point that the term seems to be almost useless -- that's my stance at least, I know there's a good amount of literature disagreeing with me. When you throw the rest of the 'totalitarian' WWII-era states in, though, it becomes even less viable. That's a whole other issue from the main point there though. In this case, again (I've probably said it ad nauseam at this point), the point is that my sense is there is a meaningful way to describe China as totalitarian and so people calling it that shouldn't be met with a kind of patronising brick wall of 'haha you still think China is the same as in the 60s'. The CCP is currently pushing to reimpose ideological controls, stamp out patronage networks challenging the monolithic authority of the central state, and in general to centralise political power in a way that I think 'totalitarian' can be used at least to describe the CCP leadership's motivating project, if not necessarily the PRC as it is right now in 2014.
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 16:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 21, 2024 13:12 |
|
|
RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Well don't leave us hanging. Mussolini and Franco, the former literally defining fascism.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 16:33
|
|
|
Zohar posted:That's a whole other issue from the main point there though. In this case, again (I've probably said it ad nauseam at this point), the point is that my sense is there is a meaningful way to describe China as totalitarian and so people calling it that shouldn't be met with a kind of patronising brick wall of 'haha you still think China is the same as in the 60s'. Zohar posted:The CCP is currently pushing to reimpose ideological controls, stamp out patronage networks challenging the monolithic authority of the central state, and in general to centralise political power in a way that I think 'totalitarian' can be used at least to describe the CCP leadership's motivating project, if not necessarily the PRC as it is right now in 2014. computer parts posted:Mussolini and Franco, the former literally defining fascism.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 16:37
|
|
|
computer parts posted:Mussolini and Franco, the former literally defining fascism. Mussolini was incredibly anti-Catholic in his personal views and made numerous public attacks on the Church throughout his reign. The Catholic Church was only courted by the Italian fascists to reign them in and make them subordinate to the state. Franco wasn't even a thing during the time period in which Chiang was supposedly pushing a fascist agenda. Franco wouldn't have even been noteworthy if Sanjurjo had the common sense to not over pack his bags. Falange didn't come into existence as well until 1933 and Falange didn't have a major impact until after WWII had started for China. Spain up until the Spanish Civil War had been far from fascist and afterwards Spain was ruled by a confederation of right wing political parties, not a single party state. EDIT: It also should be noted that Chiang was a Methodist, not a Catholic, and that makes a big difference in this discussion as well. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 17:12 on Sep 4, 2014 |
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 16:49
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:They should though because it's not. Like, it should be clear that I'm not arguing from a position of ignorance and you're usually a good poster so I'm not sure why you're just defaulting to throwing out crappy putdowns here? Well, whatever. I've already explained, I thought pretty clearly, why that isn't just authoritarianism -- authoritarianism is conventionally any form of top-down political control of whatever scale according to any kind of methods of political mobilisation and form of political policymaking, which can be for example by patronage networks, or by a transparent administrative apparatus, or a dominant-party system with constitutional options for removing that party. Modern Hungary is probably authoritarian. South Korea in the 60s or the 80s was authoritarian. Hong Kong is authoritarian. Any old constitutional dictatorship is authoritarian. You can have authoritarian democracy, authoritarian liberalism, the authoritarian predatory state, yada yada yada. Authoritarianism is an incredibly vague term in political science and theory, though obviously it's usually fairly easy to understand at least on a superficial level, unlike totalitarianism. The point is that, once again, the PRC is obviously authoritarian but it also has elements -- certainly programmatic elements -- of something more far-reaching. This more far-reaching thing is, yes, a particular permutation of authoritarian statecraft, which is similar to, let's say, Park Chung-hee's apparent designs for South Korea in the Yushin period, or obviously to fascist Italy. This is what I am calling totalitarianism, and not arbitrarily either, for reasons that have been pointed out in this thread.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 17:03
|
|
|
Just to be clear I never said that Chiang was himself a fascist, rather that he really looked up to the methods that especially Mussolini had used to kind of reign Italy back from the chaos and weakness of the post-unification era up until after WWI when Italy was kind of a basketcase. He wanted to learn from that, strengthen the backbone of China and the methods Mussolini was using were a lot more useful to him than anything he was getting from the democratic west. Also so far as I had known, Chiang was very much an opportunist rather than a serious Christian. He converted to gain access to the Soong family, to get at the legacy and relationship with not just daddy Soong but Sun Yat Sen's family. Chiang asking Americans to pray for the Chinese government was the kind of ridiculous thing that they wanted to hear, and gained him a lot of aid, but I am unaware of anything that speaks to him being personally really observant, got any stuff I should read about that?
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 19:00
|
|
|
In Generalissimo by Jay Taylor, Taylor was given unprecedented access to Chiang's personal writings and records in Taiwan. Within his personal journals, Chiang wrote Christian affirmations and things related to Jesus. Most people, even dictators, usually don't write insincere things in their personal writings that were not meant for public consumption. He wrote about his daily activities in his diary, his own failings, even blaming himself for the loss of the Civil War, and included a number of very personal details like how he contained his sexual desires. One constant though after he converted was that he pretty much read the Bible everyday. He did convert out of opportunism, which is acknowledged in the biography, but it seems that Chiang came around to liking Christianity. You can apparently read his diaries at the Hoover Institute but I don't know how available they are to the general public. It seems though that they should be available by request there. While googling about it I found this academic article http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/17535650902900364 examining Chiang's Christian related diary entries.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 19:50
|
|
|
If you think Christianity (or any Abrahamic faith) isn't compatible with fascism I've got a bridge to sell you. "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 20:00
|
|
|
Fall Sick and Die posted:Just to be clear I never said that Chiang was himself a fascist, rather that he really looked up to the methods that especially Mussolini had used to kind of reign Italy back from the chaos and weakness of the post-unification era up until after WWI when Italy was kind of a basketcase. He wanted to learn from that, strengthen the backbone of China and the methods Mussolini was using were a lot more useful to him than anything he was getting from the democratic west. Also so far as I had known, Chiang was very much an opportunist rather than a serious Christian. He converted to gain access to the Soong family, to get at the legacy and relationship with not just daddy Soong but Sun Yat Sen's family. Chiang asking Americans to pray for the Chinese government was the kind of ridiculous thing that they wanted to hear, and gained him a lot of aid, but I am unaware of anything that speaks to him being personally really observant, got any stuff I should read about that? I wouldn't say it's whether he was a devout Christian that matters as much as his general attitude towards traditional morality. Hitler and Mussolini both loathed Christian morality on a personal level and both saw the weakening (or, in Hitler's case, elimination) of Christianity as a worthwhile goal to pursue at some point down the road, Chiang was genuinely supportive of traditional "Confucian" values, which puts him in the opposite camp as the actual fascists.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 20:06
|
|
|
Fascism is not diametrically opposed to traditional morality and that's a pretty out there opinion to take if that is yours. Maybe Hitler thought it would be cooler if the people believed the moon was made of ice but that was never a part of day to day fascism, so far as I know they were opposed to the church as much as the church opposed their ability to exert their will on the nation. Again I never said that Chiang was a fascist, but that he was intrigued by how Mussolini and Hitler had built more cohesive, stronger nations from what had been chaos. Chiang did have a productive relationship with Hitler until Hitler had to choose and form then on he ignored China, but Chiang was asking for more help and cooperation, but again that doesn't make him a fascist.
|
|
#
?
Sep 4, 2014 20:18
|
|
|
Is it totalitarian or authoritarian for all propaganda related to Hong Kong "democracy" to use the phrase "two oh one seven" instead of "twenty seventeen" or anything else not dumb?
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 01:14
|
|
|
Neither, that's cyberpunk.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 02:08
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:Neither, that's cyberpunk. OH hell YEAh now I'm excited
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 02:11
|
|
|
I went to Hong Kong once and had seafood in that huge resturant that looked like a big boat (what was its name?). That place was A-OK. I hope the people of Hongkong win this autonomous political struggle.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 03:17
|
|
|
Zohar posted:
You seem like well meaning fellow but I can't help but think you're an internet expert who knows everything and has experienced nothing when it comes to living in china. In certain respects I feel much freer in China than I do in the US. For example, I could drink in public and buy smokes as a teenager which would be out of line in the US. I've never seen cocaine done so openly before outside of the US either. In my grandpa's hometown of baiying prostitutes openly operate from "hair salons." Tell me again how these are all things that you can expect in a totalitarian culture.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 03:47
|
|
|
Day to day life in China is literally freer than it is in the US.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:12
|
|
|
.
Chickenwalker fucked around with this message at 10:20 on Mar 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:16
|
|
|
Peven Stan posted:You seem like well meaning fellow but I can't help but think you're an internet expert who knows everything and has experienced nothing when it comes to living in china. In certain respects I feel much freer in China than I do in the US. For example, I could drink in public and buy smokes as a teenager which would be out of line in the US. I've never seen cocaine done so openly before outside of the US either. In my grandpa's hometown of baiying prostitutes openly operate from "hair salons." Tell me again how these are all things that you can expect in a totalitarian culture. Hahaha, indeed *nods head sagely* in China I can pay a few thousand yuan to buy a child or a wife. I can even kill people if I've got the connections! So much for the so-called Bill of Rights. Check and mate, "President" Obama.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:17
|
|
|
Chickenwalker posted:Except for not being able to see or watch or read what you want, or leave the country at will, or vote, or freely decide how many children you'll have, or where you'll live, or assemble, or bear arms, or pretty much anything really. Even my girlfriend's computer illiterate dad figured out how to install and use a free VPN to read foreign news. And people can leave the country at will, the only real restriction is that a Chinese passport doesn't get you in many other countries easily. Voting isn't really a day to day thing and most people in the US don't bother to vote anyway. I know I don't. The one child policy covers a lot fewer people than you'd think, and it's relatively easy to just ignore it anyway. Literally the only people I know that are beholden to it are government workers. Nobody's stopping anyone from moving to any other city, as long as you can afford rent. The right to assemble in protest or whatever also isn't really a day to day thing, and people not carrying guns around everywhere actually gives me the freedom to not worry about getting shot. I can freely get around everywhere without a car, to go to a restaurant that's actually just a dumpling stand some lady with a good recipe freely set up on the side of the road. She's free to have a pet cat roaming around that I can play with while I eat. I'm then free to buy a beer and drink it while walking down the street on my way into a pharmacy to buy nearly any medication I want without a prescription. I'm free from the worry of muggings, random acts of public violence, and harassment by the police. I can pretty much walk into any non-government building or area any time I want, and I can keep chickens in the stairwell of my apartment building. I can buy products that are almost exactly the same as more expensive brand name products, because in day to day life I'm mostly free of trademark and copyright restrictions. If I had a 5 year old son I'd be free to choose to not send him to school if I didn't want to, and I could send him down the street to the corner store to buy beer and cigarettes for me and I wouldn't worry about his safety. I'm free to ride the bus without paying and there's nothing they can do to stop me. I can eat cats and dogs if I want, and I could sell weird homemade hornet infused moonshine and nobody would stop me. That's not nearly an exhaustive list of things I can freely do in China that I couldn't do in the US.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:39
|
|
|
To be fair there are a lot of Chinese people who would trade all of that for non-poo poo air.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:43
|
|
|
Bloodnose posted:They just keep falling back on this idea that voting is what matters and not who you're voting for. 
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:49
|
|
|
fart simpson posted:Voting isn't really a day to day thing and most people in the US don't bother to vote anyway. I know I don't. Well aren't we just cool as hell 
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:50
|
|
|
Chickenwalker has obviously never lived in China or he wouldn't say poo poo like "they can't freely leave the country". That was true in like, the 1970s.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:53
|
|
|
fart simpson posted:Even my girlfriend's computer illiterate dad figured out how to install and use a free VPN to read foreign news. And people can leave the country at will, the only real restriction is that a Chinese passport doesn't get you in many other countries easily. Voting isn't really a day to day thing and most people in the US don't bother to vote anyway. I know I don't. The one child policy covers a lot fewer people than you'd think, and it's relatively easy to just ignore it anyway. Literally the only people I know that are beholden to it are government workers. Nobody's stopping anyone from moving to any other city, as long as you can afford rent. The right to assemble in protest or whatever also isn't really a day to day thing, and people not carrying guns around everywhere actually gives me the freedom to not worry about getting shot. That's a pretty ridiculous wall of wrong.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:54
|
|
|
Redgrendel2001 posted:That's a pretty ridiculous wall of wrong. Which of those things are inaccurate?
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:55
|
|
|
fart simpson posted:Even my girlfriend's computer illiterate dad figured out how to install and use a free VPN to read foreign news. And people can leave the country at will, the only real restriction is that a Chinese passport doesn't get you in many other countries easily. Voting isn't really a day to day thing and most people in the US don't bother to vote anyway. I know I don't. The one child policy covers a lot fewer people than you'd think, and it's relatively easy to just ignore it anyway. Literally the only people I know that are beholden to it are government workers. Nobody's stopping anyone from moving to any other city, as long as you can afford rent. The right to assemble in protest or whatever also isn't really a day to day thing, and people not carrying guns around everywhere actually gives me the freedom to not worry about getting shot. sure, they might have just about the most extensive system of internet censorship in the entire world and have managed quite effectively to erase the memory of past events from the memory of people, but hey, this guy i know did something, so that negates it totally, not mention you can street poo poo too, how can a country where that isn't acceptable call itself anything other than a totalitarian horror-show.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:56
|
|
|
dilbertschalter posted:sure, they might have just about the most extensive system of internet censorship in the entire world and have managed quite effectively to erase the memory of past events from the memory of people, but hey, this guy i know did something, so that negates it totally, not mention you can street poo poo too, how can a country where that isn't acceptable call itself anything other than a totalitarian horror-show. He doesn't even know how to type on a computer and he figured it out on his own.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:57
|
|
|
computer parts posted:To be fair there are a lot of Chinese people who would trade all of that for non-poo poo air. Stepped off the plane and felt like I stepped into the metaphysical concept of lung cancer. In additional anecdotal news the miss's relatives talk non-stop poo poo about every other country on the face of the Earth but wistfully sigh if you bring up anything involving clean air or drinkable milk.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 04:57
|
|
|
Barudak posted:
Ooh! Can we have some samples?
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 05:00
|
|
|
Chickenwalker posted:Except for not being able to see or watch or read what you want, or leave the country at will, or vote, or freely decide how many children you'll have, or where you'll live, or assemble, or bear arms, or pretty much anything really. Honestly, Facebook, Twitter, and other foreign media are not really well suited for the Chinese public. I was skeptical about using the Chinese developed social media, but after using them, I actually prefer them to what I used before. With the proliferation of mobile devices, news is more open than ever before, and most Chinese know what is really going on. Same with social media, It's not as heavily censored as you think it is, in fact, I see more boobs on Weibo than I ever do on US social media. Probably because China doesn't have a slave drive team of Indian people sitting and checking every image for a nipple.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:03
|
|
|
.
Chickenwalker fucked around with this message at 10:22 on Mar 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:05
|
|
|
Chickenwalker posted:What you describe as freedom most mature and sensible people would call lawlessness and uncouth living. Sounds like you literally don't know what you're talking about in regards to freedom or the lack thereof in China, though. I'm not saying all those freedoms are "good" but they are more "free" than the US.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:07
|
|
|
fart simpson posted:Sounds like you literally don't know what you're talking about in regards to freedom or the lack thereof in China, though. I'm not saying all those freedoms are "good" but they are more "free" than the US. The point is that the freedom to behave in social unproductive ways is more the hallmark of backwards societies than anything else. People could get away with plenty of poo poo even when the CCP was an insane murderous actual communist party, but that didn't mean there wasn't massive repression.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:11
|
|
|
Most of those things aren't "getting away with poo poo", they're just things that you're not restricted from doing. A lot of that stuff owns and I always feel vaguely uncomfortable when I read Facebook posts like "New Orleans is awesome! I can just walk down the street with an open container of alcohol!"
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:15
|
|
|
fart simpson posted:I'm free to ride the bus without paying and there's nothing they can do to stop me. I can eat cats and dogs if I want, and I could sell weird homemade hornet infused moonshine and nobody would stop me. That's not nearly an exhaustive list of things I can freely do in China that I couldn't do in the US. So, you're a member of the privileged elite in a system that depends on the unquestioning subservience of 100s of millions of those below you. You're basically describing living like a rich aristocrat in the 1600s, where all those below you have no recourse to stop your abuses towards them and you know the people running the country so you face no repercussion. Civilized countries have moved beyond that and attempted to institute rules of law for everyone, not just the poor disenfranchised masses who can't pay the bribes to the magistrates. I can only assume you're a troll, because otherwise you represent the absolute worst of people living in the PRC and are openly bragging about it on a internet forum. Also, its not so much "things you're free to do" so much as "thing's I'm able to do without repercussion because no civil authority exists to stop me and I'm above them" pentyne fucked around with this message at 06:24 on Sep 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:22
|
|
|
Chickenwalker posted:What you describe as freedom most mature and sensible people would call lawlessness and uncouth living. Ah yes, the old "you don't adhere to my extremely narrow and jaded worldviews, you must be a savage" argument.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:25
|
|
|
No, that's not just for privileged people. I do pay on the bus, but I've seen plenty of poor people free ride and the drivers obviously dislike it but don't actually have any power to make them pay or make them leave. e: Civil authority very obviously exists in China. It's not the lawless wild west. I'm just talking about things that aren't restricted, not saying I can "get away" with stuff. fart simpson fucked around with this message at 06:30 on Sep 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:25
|
|
|
.
Chickenwalker fucked around with this message at 10:22 on Mar 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:26
|
|
|
Chickenwalker posted:What you describe as freedom most mature and sensible people would call lawlessness and uncouth living. Years ago there was a guy who would brag about riding a motorcycle drunk up the stairs in the park by his apartment every day on his way home from work. Same poo poo, not freedom, just dickbaggery.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:31
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 21, 2024 13:12 |
|
|
Look at those goalposts go! And actually, I'm a communist. And I've never seen a public hazard here in China because of public intoxication, and they have very effective punishments and services to discourage drunk driving.
|
|
#
?
Sep 5, 2014 06:33
|
|